RESOURCES FOR CURRENT STUDENTS

Academic Calendar

Semester 1, 2019
start: 4 March (regardless of start date at home univerisity)

NB: If you will be doing the Epidemiology (EPI) unit delivered by the University of Queensland or the University of Sydney, this starts on25 Feb (as it is delivered to a larger cohort of internal students at these universities).

census date: 31 March (confirm cut-off dates with your home university, eg the date is a week earlier at Macquarie.)mid-semester break: dependent upon individual unit timetablesend-semester: this can be calculated by the submission date of your final assignment/exam.
The BCA Examiners meeting will be held on 25 June.

Semester 2, 2019
start: 29 July (regardless of start date at home univerisity)

NB: If you will be doing the Epidemiology (EPI) unit delivered by the University of Queensland,this starts on 22 July (as it is delivered to a larger cohort of internal students at UQ).

census date: 31 August (confirm cut-off dates with your home university, eg the date is a week earlier at Macquarie.)mid-semester break: dependent upon individual unit timetablesend-semester: this can be calculated by the submission date of your final assignment/exam.
The BCA Examiners meeting will be held on 20 Nov.

Note that the Learning Management System (eLearning LMS) used for delivery of BCA units (apart from EPI) has changed, from Blackboard to Canvas (first dellivery in Canvas was in semester 2, 2018).

Results for both semesters

Results will be transmitted to universities after the BCA Examiners meeting has convened. They will be released by your home university in accordance with their calendar. You will find them in your online student portal.

TIMELY ENROLMENT: BCA courses are delivered by distance across 6 universites. These additional requirements can add to the standard time lines for enrolment processeing at universites. We recommend that you refer to university calendars and enrol in good time before the start of semester.

STUDY RESOURCES: It is important to buy study resources as soon as possible. As most students will be buying textbooks and software remotely from suppliers or home universities, there are likely to be delays while licesences are arranged (for some software) and materials are posted or shipped.

Students should have been given access to online unit sites (in Blackboard) by the start of semester, where they will find study materials to read online or download.

As a courtesy, hard copy materials may also sent by post. Enrolment windows at universities mean that coordinators are unable to guarantee delivery before study commences.

CONTACT DETAILS: The BCA Office has no direct link to student records at each university. Once we have received BCA Contact Forms (from newly enrolled students) or official class lists (for all currently enrolled students) from postgraduate offices at home universities, information that you register at your home university will not filter through to the BCA Office on an ongoing basis. You will need to send an email to unit coordinators and the BCA Office, telling them about any changes to your enrolment or contact details. It is particularly important that we have immediate access to the email address that you regularly use (not necessarily you university provided student email) and current postal address.

CENSUS DATES: As a general rule, the census is the cutoff date for withdrawal from units of study without financial penalty, however, policy for this differs across universities and students should make enquiries at their home university. If students wish to withdraw from units, or take leave of absence or withdraw from studies, they should do this at their home university.

EPIDEMIOLOGY DELIVERY: Depending on their home university, students may have a choice of options for studying EPI in one or both semesters. Home university postgraduate advisors may direct students to the EPI offered at that university, or students may be able to choose between units delivered face-to-face or by distance locally or, alternatively, by distance at the University of Queensland.This is the only instance in the BCA curriculum where a choice for study options may exist.All other BCA units are delivered by distance by one university only in any semester.

Program coordinators at each consortium university can advise about Epidemiology choices.
If a local study option is not offered at a home university, students will be doing (Introduction to) Epidemiology delivered by distance by the University of Queensland.

Coordinator Contacts:

BCA Program Outline

Details include entry requirements, course objectives and unit of study outlines. See the curriculum table on page 5 for unit listing, semester availability, and prerequisites for units of study. See page 6 for examples of how you might structure your studies.

Online Resources (textbook and journal access at home university libraries)

Posting copyright material (such as journal articles) online is prohibited by universities. This includes BCA eLearning sites.These references must be accessed through university libraries.
Select the link for your home university to search for availablity of journals and textbooks.

How to use the Equation Editor

Useful video for creating statistical equations: created for the BCA unit, Probability and Distribution Theory, but it has general use across BCA units.

Warning: There is a known issue in Equation Ediitor that corrupts equations when auto save is activated in Word documents, and converts them to non-editable pictures.

There are a couple of workrounds for this:

When using the Equation Editor, you should consider disabling the auto-save function.
Note that, If you do disable auto-save, you should manually save your work regularly, to avoid losing it in the event of a crash or other unexpected closing of Word or Windows (eg to perform updates).

Students have told us that the 'Mathtype' plugin for MS Word is easy to use, produces nice looking equations and doesn't have the noted bug.
A 30-day trial version is available for free download, after which it runs in "lite" mode, which appears to be perfectly adequate.

Guidelines for Reporting Statistical Results

Biostatistics Research/Practical Project* (WPP) Guidelines

Description of specifications for the unit WPP, including supervision and assessment requirements.

NOTE: Adequate supervisory arrangements must be in place before students commence this unit. Students wishing to enrol in WPP must discuss options with the BCA program coordinator at their home university.

More information:

Biostatistics Research/Practical Project* (WPP) Examples

*Title differs across universities. Called the Biostatistics Research Project at The University of Adelaide, Macquarie University and The University of Sydney; the Biostatistics Practical Project at Monash University;and Special Topic/Thesis in Biostatistics at The University of Queensland. The unit code WPP is used in BCA documentation. As is the case for all BCA units, the university unit/course/subject code will be used at respective universities. (WPP is a legacy acronym for Workplace Project Portfolio, which was the original name of the unit.)

SSAI Code of Conduct

Attachment to WPP Guidelines (see Preface, page 2). More information:

On Being a Scientist

The scientific enterprise is built on a foundation of trust. Society
trusts that scientific research results are an honest and accurate
reflection of a researcher’s work. Researchers equally trust that their
colleagues have gathered data carefully, have used appropriate analytic
and statistical techniques, have reported their results accurately,
and have treated the work of other researchers with respect...

Upon Graduation...

Students who have successfully completed their degree, diploma or certificate in biostatistics will graduate from their home university. Graduates receive official acknowledgement of their academic award from this university, ie the university in which they were enrolled and where their student transcript for the course is recorded.

The BCA (represented by all consortium universities collectively) is proud of the achievements of its graduates and acknowledges this by giving a certificate and a letter of congratulations from the BCA Steering Committee to students who have received a (Post)Graduate Diploma or Masters degree.

Star Graduates will receive additional acknowledgment in the letter and certificate.
A Star Graduate is a graduate from the Masters or Graduate Diploma who has achieved an overall average of at least 85%, with no more than one unit of study less than 85%. Star grad status is based on first 10 units if doing 2 WPPS and first 11 if one WPP.